“It doesn’t matter where you are . . . you win in the Western Hockey League with 18, 19 and quality 20-year-olds, and it’s homegrown,” said Jeff Chynoweth, who was formally introduced as the Hitmen’s new general manager on Tuesday. “Training camp starts Aug. 24 — it’s hard to believe when it’s July that it’s only six weeks away.

“There’s a lot of work that needs to be done, but I’m used to it.

“It’s nothing new on that end.”

Chynoweth was introduced alongside new head coach Dallas Ferguson and new director of player personnel Dallas Thompson.

The new GM brings a wealth of WHL experience, having served with the Kootenay Ice for 16 years, holding the roles of owner, president and general manager.

His family sold the team earlier this year but not before he’d helped steward the Ice to three WHL titles (2000, ’02 and ’11) and won the Memorial Cup in ’02.

“I don’t think Jeff needed to sell us on anything, with his experience,” said Hitmen vice-president and alternate governor Mike Moore. “We’ve got some work to do, but I think he’s going to be a tremendous addition.”

Returning to Calgary to act as GM for a Hitmen team that snuck into the playoffs with a late regula- season surge before getting eliminated in Round 1 of the playoffs, Chynoweth says he wants the team to remain competitive but couldn’t say where he expected them to finish in the coming season.

“They know how to win — they’ve got that culture, and you’ve got to keep that culture,” Chynoweth said. “I don’t know, looking at the roster, where they would fit in the league because you never know which players are going to come back, which over-agers take their game to the next level. There’s a lot of variables.”

Like Chynoweth, the move to the Hitmen also marks something of a homecoming for Ferguson, who grew up in Wainwright, Alta., but has spent 13 years with the men’s hockey program with the NCAA’s Alaska Fairbanks Nanooks.

He served as head coach for the past nine years with the Nanooks, earning coach-of-the-year honours in ’08-09 after guiding the team to a fourth-place finish in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association and then helped the team to its first-ever NCAA tournament appearance the following year.

Asked about setting expectations for his first year in charge with the Hitmen, Ferguson said it was all about getting the process right.

“The expectation is we’ve gotta have a successful training camp and then make sure that, coming out of camp, we’re doing the right things to be successful,” Ferguson said. “Ultimately, we want to win a championship, but to me, we’ll work backwards, and you can’t do that without starting Day 1 the right way.”

For his part, Thompson joined the Hitmen in July of ’15 and has served as British Columbia scouting director. He bring more than 17 years of scouting and WHL managerial experience to the role.

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